Table of Contents
Welcome to the latest edition of our weekly roundup. Every Monday, we’ll send you a summary of the biggest stories about bodily autonomy. We’ll also include links to pieces that Garnet or Susan have published.
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Let’s dive in.
On Autonomy News
Utah’s statewide Planned Parenthood affiliate recently considered a plan to help elect moderate Republican candidates, Susan reported last week. Planned Parenthood Action Council of Utah (PPAC) explored making contributions to political action committees, which would allow them to boost moderate Republicans challenging far-right incumbents without voters knowing they were involved. However, a spokesperson said the project didn’t move forward. (Share this story on Instagram, Bluesky, or TikTok.)
Susan Rinkunas
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Federal news
Anti-abortion groups are furious that Republican leaders in Congress are advancing a budget bill that would not extend the one-year “defund” of large abortion providers like Planned Parenthood. As we’ve explained, House Speaker Mike Johnson is pursuing a narrow bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security via the budget reconciliation process—the maneuver Congress used last year, which only requires 50 Senate votes to pass. Now, Johnson will reportedly unveil a framework for a third, broader reconciliation bill. However, abortion opponents rightly note that it would be all but impossible to pass such a bill before the law kicking Planned Parenthood out of the Medicaid program lapses in July.
Enter Missouri Senator Josh Hawley: First, he offered a failed amendment to the current budget bill that would have “defunded” Planned Parenthood for 10 years. Now, Hawley is calling out Speaker Johnson by name and claiming Republicans must extend the “defund” provision because Planned Parenthood also provides gender-affirming care. Care for transgender people was not mentioned in the bill passed last year, but Hawley is pulling from his despicable bag of tricks to try to get people on board with restricting abortion by changing the subject to trans people. He only seems to trot out this tactic when he knows he’s losing, but the rhetoric is dangerous nonetheless.
Indiana Senator Jim Banks has jumped on the “investigate abortion pill manufacturers and providers” train, in this case asking the Federal Trade Commission to look into allegedly false and misleading claims about the drugs’ safety. His letter cites the popular (and entirely factual) claim that mifepristone is safer than Tylenol, and is remarkably similar to the lawsuit filed against Planned Parenthood by former Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey last summer—one of Bailey’s last acts as AG before Donald Trump appointed him Co-Deputy Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Banks joins Josh Hawley and Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy as leaders in the charge to push federal agencies to investigate manufacturers and providers of abortion pills, mifepristone in particular. Hawley demanded that the Department of Justice investigate one manufacturer, Danco Laboratories, while Cassidy urged the Food and Drug Administration to collaborate with other agencies—including Customs and Border Protection and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service—to investigate a very specific list of telemedicine services and other pill providers.
The policy arm of the Southern Baptist Convention is urging senators to vote against Casey Means, Trump’s wildly unqualified wellness influencer pick for Surgeon General. In particular, the SBC took issue with Means’ answer to a confirmation hearing question about whether an in-person visit should be required to get a prescription for mifepristone. Means said this was “out of the purview of the surgeon general’s office.” Her confirmation has already been stalled for months, partly because she gave birth in the fall, but also because of her wishy-washy views on vaccines.
The fate of telehealth access to mifepristone is currently in the hands of the ultraconservative Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals after the state of Louisiana appealed a judge’s ruling pausing its lawsuit against the Food and Drug Administration. New amicus briefs argue that ordering the FDA to reinstate in-person appointments would harm domestic violence survivors, disabled people, and military readiness. (The briefs come from Legal Voice, the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund, and Vet Voice Foundation, respectively.) Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill and attorneys from Alliance Defending Freedom asked the court to reinstate a nationwide ban on telemedicine prescriptions of the drug by May 11.
A federal appeals court said a lawsuit challenging North Carolina’s restrictions on medication abortion could move forward after being on hold for more than two years. Republican state lawmakers asked the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals to allow the case to proceed after what they saw as a favorable Fourth Circuit ruling in a similar suit out of West Virginia. But that case was about a total ban on abortion, not restrictions on medication abortion specifically. An OB/GYN originally sued North Carolina lawmakers in 2023, arguing that then-new restrictions on abortion pills directly contradicted federal regulations—meaning FDA policy. A lower court judge threw out part of the law, which said that only physicians could prescribe abortion pills and not advance practice providers, but the judge left in place a requirement that patients have an in-person exam. The FDA has allowed telehealth prescriptions since 2021, and made the change permanent in 2023.
State news
A Wyoming judge blocked the state’s six-week abortion ban, which had been in effect since mid-March, while litigation over its constitutionality continues. Governor Mark Gordon acknowledged that the ban was likely doomed when he signed it, given the state Supreme Court’s recent ruling that permanently overturned a total ban and a medication abortion ban. Abortion is once again legal until fetal viability and via telemedicine in Wyoming.
In Tennessee, the trial in a case that seeks to clarify medical exceptions to the state’s abortion ban was scheduled to start today. However, Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti (yes, that Skrmetti) filed a successful eleventh-hour appeal and got the trial canceled. This year, Tennessee enacted two laws—HB 1971 and SB 1731—which make it harder to sue the state, and easier for the state to appeal certain court rulings, respectively. Skrmetti’s successful appeal, made on the basis of SB 1731, resulted in the state Court of Appeals taking jurisdiction in the case, which forced the lower court to cancel its planned trial. The lawsuit was filed by a group of women who were denied lifesaving abortion care in Tennessee, and also includes two physicians and the American Medical Association as plaintiffs.
South Carolina’s SB 1095—an abortion ban staggering in its sheer scope and scale—passed out of committee last week, and now heads to the full Senate for consideration. GOP leaders still say the ban is unlikely to pass, but this is farther than similar legislation advanced just last year. Abortion is currently legal until about six weeks in South Carolina, but if enacted, SB 1095 would ban nearly all abortions; make having an abortion a misdemeanor offense; make it a felony to provide abortion-inducing drugs to a pregnant person, outlaw possession of abortion pills; make mifepristone and misoprostol controlled substances, outlaw helping minors travel for abortion care without a parent's permission, and prohibit abortion providers from receiving government funds for family planning. Meanwhile, both chambers of the legislature have passed a bill that would create a tax credit for people who donate to crisis pregnancy centers.
Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger signed a package of bills dubbed the “Momnibus,” as the laws are meant to address disparities in maternal health care and increase support for new parents. One bill expands the focus of the state’s maternal mortality review committee to also track severe maternal morbidity, or serious complications that cause short- or long-term health consequences. Another will require Medicaid to cover remote monitoring services for high-risk patients for up to a year after giving birth. Nearly 40% of pregnancy-related deaths in 2022 happened between six weeks and one year postpartum.
However, Spanberger also attempted to dilute a law that will repeal the state’s ban on collective bargaining for public employees. This would seem to conflict with her desire to support moms, given that union membership helps women—especially women of color—earn higher wages, access better benefits, and attain economic security for their families. The legislature rejected Spanberger’s proposed amendments to the bill, so she now has 30 days to decide whether or not to sign the original version.
Elections
Voters in Virginia approved a constitutional amendment creating new Congressional maps in response to Republicans’ brazen off-cycle, Trump-backed redistricting push that kicked off in Texas and spread to other states. GOP leadership knows they’re destined to lose control of the House this November, and that’s one reason they might try to ram through a third budget bill that “defunds” Planned Parenthood: The next few months are their last chance to pass any legislation without Democratic votes. Still, there are multiple lawsuits over the Virginia amendment.
An anti-abortion political action committee in Idaho is texting people who signed a petition to put a reproductive freedom amendment on the ballot, claiming that they may have been misled and instructing them to ask to have their names removed. Idaho has a total abortion ban; the proposed amendment would overturn that ban and create a right to abortion before fetal viability. The texting campaign from Idaho Chooses Life comes soon after amendment organizers said they’re confident they’ve gathered enough signatures to get on the ballot. It’s not clear how the conservative group got this contact information, as Idahoans United for Women and Families said it didn’t collect phone numbers.
First Amendment watch
The American Center for Law and Justice—a right-wing firm founded by televangelist Pat Robertson and led by lawyer Jay Sekulow—has filed an official complaint with the Department of Health and Human Services, alleging that Massachusetts violated a range of federal laws by running a public information campaign to raise awareness about deceptive practices at crisis pregnancy centers. Specifically, ACLJ claims the campaign ran afoul of federal laws that protect healthcare professionals who deny certain care based on their own religious views. The state ran this campaign in collaboration with the reproductive rights advocacy organization Reproductive Equity Now, which is named throughout the complaint. This is yet another example of anti-abortion organizations turning state attempts to regulate CPCs as an opportunity to fight back and gain legal protections that enable them to spread medical disinformation. Trump’s HHS has already taken steps to weaponize “conscience” protections against states that protect abortion rights, meaning we’re likely to see more of this.
Assaults on queer people
The Supreme Court turned away another “parental rights” case regarding gender transition policies in public schools, this one from Florida. A lower court dismissed two parents’ challenge to a school district policy that allowed their child to use a different name and pronouns at school without notifying them. In choosing not to intervene, the Court has allowed that ruling to stand. Last week, the justices declined to take up a similar case from Massachusetts, even though they recently blocked a California law that prohibited school districts from requiring teachers to tell parents when their kids socially transition.
However, the Supreme Court will decide whether Colorado is allowed to exclude Catholic schools from its universal pre-K program because of their refusal to accept students with same-sex parents. Unsurprisingly, the Trump administration has already weighed in on the side of the Catholic preschools. The Court will hear arguments in this case, St. Mary Catholic Parish v. Roy, in its next term, which begins in October.
The Federal Trade Commission is looking for ways to penalize gender-affirming care providers and professional organizations that support access to the care, like the American Academy of Pediatrics, World Professional Association for Transgender Health, and the Endocrine Society. The FTC has issued subpoenas—or legal demands for information—to these organizations, similar to how the Department of Justice has targeted gender-affirming care providers. Leading these investigations will be new hire Glenna Goldis, who says she was fired from the office of New York Attorney General Letitia James due to her anti-trans statements.
The Ohio House passed HB 249, a bill that purports to “modernize” indecent exposure laws by protecting “children from harmful and obscene adult performances” and guaranteeing privacy in “spaces such as restrooms and locker rooms.” The bill also expands the definition of nudity to include visible cleavage or “anal cleft”—that’s right, the buttcrack—and creates a broad new category of “seminudity.” This would criminalize the wearing of clothing that “covers not more than the genitals, pubic region, and nipple of the female breast, as well as portions of the body covered by supporting straps or devices.” In other words, conservatives are attempting to use manufactured panic about drag shows and trans people in public bathrooms to pass a law with language so broad it could be used to arrest women wearing bathing suits, sports bras, or even leggings and low-cut tops, in public.
Actual good news
A former abortion clinic in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, has relocated to a larger space where it can serve several hundred patients per month. The new location of WAWC Healthcare, formerly known as West Alabama Women's Center, has treatment rooms, a mental health suite, and a waiting area for children. Patients can access services like prenatal care, birth control, and gender-affirming care. WAWC will also have a satellite clinic in Birmingham three days a week, and is embarking on a new partnership with Alabama Prison Birth Project.
Quick hits
- The world’s biggest producer of condoms said it plans to raise prices by 20 to 30 percent due to supply chain disruptions from Trump’s illegal and absurd war in Iran. Karex is a supplier to leading brands like Trojan and Durex.
- Women on Waves, the human rights organization run by physician Rebecca Gomperts, is distributing abortion pills via 15 lockboxes across Malta, a European country where abortion was illegal without exception until 2023. It’s now legal only to save the life of the pregnant person.
- A study published in the American Journal of Public Health found a link between abortion bans and deaths during or within one year of pregnancy.
- An appeals court in Kenya overturned a lower court decision that established a right to abortion. The Center for Reproductive Rights says it will appeal the decision to the Supreme Court of Kenya.
Palate cleanser
He’s doing it!!
@lucidflyingsexdreams Well I’ll be damned . #chicken #whydidthechickencrosstheroad #togettotheotherside #prophecy ♬ original sound - Nat_speaks
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